Government cheques are being sent out this week to the first 181 of more than 1,300 coastal skippers who have agreed to quit netting for wild salmon.
Some 1,269 applicants among 1,553 eligible licence holders have been approved for the €25 million compensation scheme, which is intended to underpin the new ban on driftnetting, and voluntary compensation for people who surrender draft net licences in estuaries.
The highest payment will be €195,774, while the average will be €18,900 - and that is subject to tax. Some 40 applications were refused and six decisions are "pending", according to the Department of Energy which is the "caretaker" department for inland fisheries.
A geographical breakdown shows that Donegal has the largest number of applicants, at 250. However, John O'Brien, a father of six young children from Inishbofin island, is not among them, and believes a special case should be made for islanders.
"I'm not going to sell out my children's rights, though I could do with the money - small enough as it is. At least I can sleep at night," he told The Irish Times this week, en route back from fishing crab 25 miles west of Tory Island. "I know a good few on Inishbofin, and on Arranmore next to us, who didn't apply also," O'Brien said. "My options are very limited, because I'm on an island.
"We've all had to move to lobster and crab much earlier than we would, because of the new ban on salmon."
Mr O'Brien believes the ban is less to do with environmental protection, and more to do with "class" and a transfer of the salmon resource from public to private hands, ie the sector involving private fishery owners and up to 30,000 anglers.
Prof Noel Wilkins's successor on the National Salmon Commission, chairman Joey Murrin, has called for a greater Government commitment to monitoring and control of inland waterways. A small amount of fish caught on legal draft net licences is being sold, legitimately, he acknowledges.
"But €100 is being paid for a decent-size salmon through private sales, and I believe there's an abuse of the tagging system and salmon is being poached, mainly inland," he told The Irish Times.
"Why put people off the water offshore if we are not going to have equitable controls inland?" Mr Murrin said. He believes some 90 sea fishery officers employed for the commercial fishery should be deployed to detect illegal salmon trading.
"The vast majority of anglers are obeying the rules, but there is a hard core of dedicated gangs operating on rivers. It seems as if the judiciary is sympathetic to anglers and it is hard to get convictions."
Private fishery owner Ian Powell of the Blackwater Lodge and Salmon Fishery in Co Waterford says the benefit of the net ban offshore is becoming apparent, with more larger grilse and salmon making it through to the river.
Geographical spread of driftnet licence compensation payments: Clare 53; Cork 178; Derry 1; Donegal 240; Dublin 16; Galway 101; Kerry 121; Kilkenny 37; Limerick 28; Louth 61; Mayo 113; Meath 21; Monaghan 1; Sligo 20; Tipperary 20; Waterford 148; Wexford 101; Wicklow 9. Total 1,269.
